'Gross miscarriage of justice': Minister singles out Clarence Thomas over SCOTUS affirmative action ruling

30 June 2023

Late June 2023 brought a series of U.S. Supreme Court bombshells. A combination of liberals, progressives, centrists and right-wing Never Trump conservatives applauded the High Court's 6-3 ruling in Moore v. Harper, which shot down a fringe far-right legal idea known as the independent state legislature (ISL) theory. But there was a major outcry from the left when the Court's right-wing justices struck down President Joe Biden's student debt relief program on Friday, June 30 and banned the use of affirmative action in college admissions the day before that.

In two companion cases, Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina, all six of the Court's Republican-appointed justices ruled that race cannot be a factor in college admissions decisions. And the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment was cited as a reason for striking down affirmative action.

While Moore v. Harper was applauded by both the left and the non-MAGA right, reactions to the Students for Fair Admissions rulings showed a major left/right divide. The progressive Rev. William Barber, in an op-ed published by MSNBC's website on June 29, lays out some reasons why he strongly disagrees with the decisions.

"If Chief Justice John Roberts, the white man who wrote the majority opinion, and Justice Clarence Thomas, the Black man who wrote a concurring opinion, believe that no further action is needed to undo all the damage of 400 years of slavery and Jim Crow," Barber argues, "then they can just as easily justify rolling back protections for women, the disabled and others who've found protection under the 14th Amendment…. Racism is not over."

Barber stresses that Roberts and Thomas' arguments in the Students for Fair Admissions rulings show a failure to understand why affirmative action came about in the first place.

"Affirmative action does not admit unqualified students," Barber writes. "It makes sure qualified students are not wrongly denied, and it says you cannot have an institution that benefits from the tax dollars of all people and use those resources to perpetuate the social advantage caused by past discrimination…. Students from the top 1 percent of families by income are 77 times more likely to get into an Ivy League college than those from the bottom 20 percent."

Barber continues, "Affirmative action proponents don't argue someone should automatically get in because they come from a disadvantaged position. The argument is that a history of disadvantage could be considered during admissions decisions to give consideration to those who would have otherwise been overlooked. Today's decision takes away that possibility. It is a gross miscarriage of justice."

The Rev. William Barber's full op-ed is available at this link.

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